Sydney, Hunter and Illawarra Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Friday 26th July)

Best Days: Sat/Sun: keep an eye out for a low confidence, sneaky E'ly swell. Late Tues/Wed: solid S'ly swell, though wind affected. Thurs/Fri look better with lighter winds and moderate S'ly swells. 

Recap: Thursday delivered fun S’ly swell at exposed beaches with sets in the 2-3ft range. This swell eased right back today, and most beaches have been tiny however this afternoon has seen a few small sneaky E/NE sets up around 2ft from strong though poorly positioned sub topical low that was E/NE of New Zealand earlier in the week. 

Sneaky E'ly swell at Manly this afternoon

This weekend (July 27 - 28)

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There’s very little action in our swell window at the moment, and with only a weak series of cold fronts pushing through the western Tasman Sea on Saturday, our south swell potential for the next few days is only small. A few 1-2ft sets are possible at south facing beaches late Saturday and also on Sunday though I doubt they’ll amount to much in the way of quality surf.

However, our flukey E’ly swell that showed this afternoon is definitely punching a little higher than expected (unusually, it’s only a little smaller than what we’re seeing in Far Northern NSW and SE Qld, which was in much better alignment). 

If we assess the raw model data on its own, we’re expecting ocean swell heights to double between 6pm this evening and 6am tomorrow (from a whopping 0.2m to 0.4m!), but also for swell periods to increase a little more, to just over 16 seconds.


I still can’t bring myself to confidently forecast quality surf from this event, but given this afternoon’s stray sets, the odd fun session certainly can’t be ruled out.

By and large, most breaks will see very small surf on Saturday - or at the very least, extremely inconsistent conditions - but there’s certainly the potential for a handful of swell magnets to rake in the odd fun wave, perhaps around 2ft+. Sure, this isn’t much bigger than what we’re seeing now, but gut feel just doesn’t hold true for shoulder/head high surf (or bigger!) from this event. If it eventuates, it’ll be one for the record books - fingers crossed, either way (i.e. my hope is for small surf so that I’m right, you’re all hoping I’m wrong, and that it ends up bigger).

Whatever eventuates Saturday will ease into Sunday. 

Also, there may be a small E’ly swell arrive on Sunday, from a weak fetch off the low in the eastern Tasman right now but don’t bank on any size. It’s a pretty unimpressive system.

Oh, as for conditions - aside from a period of moderate SW tending S’ly winds through Saturday as the front clips the region (mainly mid-late morning thru’ early afternoon), conditions should be clean with light winds out of the W/SW. 

Next week (July 29 onwards)

Monday will start out with small leftovers from the weekend and light offshore winds. 

A strong front will push through the lower Tasman Sea on Tuesday, delivering fresh S/SE winds and building local swells (3ft south facing beaches), but a strong S’ly groundswell will arrive late afternoon ahead of a peak on Wednesday, generated by the parent low south of Tasmania (on Monday) which looks pretty impressive. 

There’s a nice slingshot expected to occur as the low approaches Tasmania on Sunday afternoon - right on the western periphery of our south swell window - and I think that could offer a pulse of bigger surf above the broader regional expectations (i.e. occasional 5-6ft+ sets at south swell magnets, though in general we’re probably looking at a 3-5ft south swell event). 

Getting the timing on this is important though as Tuesday afternoon’s possible late arrival will be accompanied with poor winds. Wednesday morning looks little better though could still be a lingering southerly flow. 

Let’s take a look in more detail on Monday. 

Others, the rest of the week will maintain moderate levels of southerly swell from secondary fronts pushing through the central/eastern Tasman Sea, ahead of an enormous Southern Ocean low below Tasmania at the end of the model runs that suggests a brief though impressive long period swell around the middle of next weekend (only low confidence at this early stage though).

Have a great weekend!